MM Hunter focus dump?

Hey guys, quick question.

Icy-veins says for focus dumping (while Chimera is on cooldown), you should be using Arcane Shots over Aimed Shots for a higher DPS yield.
I was always taught to use Aimed Shot as a focus dump, especially while under the effects of a haste buff (or perhaps even always if you had a haste build), or while standing still - thanks to the new Glyph of Aimed Shot, my old idea would mean you always dumped with Aimed Shot.

For your focus dump:
-- Use Aimed Shot as your focus dump only when sufficiently hasted (below about 1.3s outside the CA phase and 1.8s inside the CA phase as a guideline) and when not experiencing interruptions or cast pushbacks
-- Use AS as your focus dump when you are unhasted, on the move, or when experiencing possible interruptions or pushbacks.

DPET (= Damage Per Execute Time) for Aimed Shot outside of CA is lower than AS unless the "execute time" part of the equation drops low enough. I haven't done the math this expansion, but last expansion I was hard casting AiS at <=1.7s, even outside of CA. It might be different now.

DPET (= Damage Per Execute Time) for Aimed Shot outside of CA is lower than AS unless the "execute time" part of the equation drops low enough. I haven't done the math this expansion, but last expansion I was hard casting AiS at <=1.7s, even outside of CA. It might be different now.

Im pretty sure arcane shot does more damage compared to aimed now. The EJ guide says 1.3 normally and 1.8 in CA but that was before the AiS buff in 5.2. Its probably .1s higher now so you can use it when under RF or BL outside the CA phase if you have at least T14 gear.

DPET (= Damage Per Execute Time) for Aimed Shot outside of CA is lower than AS unless the "execute time" part of the equation drops low enough. I haven't done the math this expansion, but last expansion I was hard casting AiS at <=1.7s, even outside of CA. It might be different now.

Last expansion it was worth it to cast aimed over arcane even at 2 sec/cast and higher. They changed the weapon damage formulas with MoP though so it should be different now.

I haven't done PvE this expansion, but I always cast aimed in PvP unless I'm facing a target with plate and a shield. I would imagine in PvE you would want to cast aimed all the time because you undoubtedly have more haste and a higher ilvl weapon than I do.

Im pretty sure arcane shot does more damage compared to aimed now. The EJ guide says 1.3 normally and 1.8 in CA but that was before the AiS buff in 5.2. Its probably .1s higher now so you can use it when under RF or BL outside the CA phase if you have at least T14 gear.

Normally I like EJ, but they're a bad source to check for when you should be casting aimed. Whitefyst just has something against aimed shot. Last expansion I remember him suggesting to cast arcane all the time in T11 and Firelands even though it was clearly worse than hardcasting.

I recommend you go to a dummy, find out what AI hits for, then find out what 2 arcanes plus 1 auto shot hits for. If AI hits as hard as 2 arcanes + 1 auto, you should be using AI all the time, no questions asked. The reason you have to add the 1 auto shot to the arcane side of the equation is because when casting AI, you don't cast your autos. Also, AI benefits from piercing shots, so if AI (non-crit) is equal to 2 arcanes and 1 autos, then once you factor in piercing shots your AI will be head and shoulders above arcane.

He also suggested the AS dump in Firelands as AiS did not proc ToTH for your pets and the others did. A couple different factors played into his recommendation of not hardcasting as a dump.

The reasoning is irrelevant, because he was wrong. AI was better for DPS than arcane from T11 onwards. In fact, it's still better than arcane. That 1.3s cast time he's recommending is just bullshit. AI is better right now even at a 2 second cast time.

The reasoning is irrelevant, because he was wrong. AI was better for DPS than arcane from T11 onwards. In fact, it's still better than arcane. That 1.3s cast time he's recommending is just bullshit. AI is better right now even at a 2 second cast time.

I'd say 2 seconds is just stretching it. You have to factor in the loss of your auto shot swing timer during your AiS casts. It's lower than 2 seconds, but not that far.

I'd say 2 seconds is just stretching it. You have to factor in the loss of your auto shot swing timer during your AiS casts. It's lower than 2 seconds, but not that far.

Maybe, but anyone will be under a 2 second cast time with the 10% raid haste buff and the 15% haste from casting steady shot. I just used 2 seconds because easier to compare 2 arcanes to 1 AI than 1.8 arcanes or whatever.

I still believe AI would be better @ 2 seconds because that's when I cast it in PvP, but it's kind of pointless to do the math on it for this topic when no one will have a 2 sec cast time on AI in raids.

The reasoning is irrelevant, because he was wrong. AI was better for DPS than arcane from T11 onwards. In fact, it's still better than arcane. That 1.3s cast time he's recommending is just bullshit. AI is better right now even at a 2 second cast time.

From what I remember the strategy was to hardcast aimed unless it was movement heavy and then you should use arcane while moving. Its possible this didnt come from Whitefyst though. Also there werent a lot of Patchwerk fights in T12/13, just Bal in FL and Ultrax in DS.

From what I remember the strategy was to hardcast aimed unless it was movement heavy and then you should use arcane while moving. Its possible this didnt come from Whitefyst though. Also there werent a lot of Patchwerk fights in T12/13, just Bal in FL and Ultrax in DS.

They eventually changed their post to this after much arguing by me, but that was still a lazy way to play. On most fights you could cast AI full time and simply swap to fox and steady when you needed to move. Only rarely would you need to move with close to full focus, which is when you would use arcane instead of steady. You could get away with less than 5 arcane shots on a lot of fights. The only times you only ever needed to cast arcane full-time was on certain phases of fights where there was lots of random, unpredictable movement that could have caused you to interrupt your AI mid-cast (P3 H Rag, air phase Atramedes).

Of course this is all irrelevant now with the aimed glyph and the removal of aspect of the fox. There's no reason not to cast AI now unless you're getting a fuckload of spell pushback.

I hardcasted AiS full time on heroic Rag, and that had a shit ton of movement. It all had to do with timing your AiS right between World in Flames. For seeds, everyone was focus hording to pop MS into the seeds, so that's not really applicable.